According to Brent Haumann, Managing Director of Striata, so much of customer experience is about the relationship an organisation has with its customers. You simply can’t build, or even maintain, a relationship in silence. This is when you need the six superpowers of digital communication. Used properly, digital communication can be used to transform a disengaged customer into an engaged one.
Most companies understand the importance of constantly improving the customer experience. They have likely seen the research that shows how focusing on customer experience can generate a 20-30% increase in customer satisfaction and economic gains of 20-50%. They are probably also familiar with the fact that most consumers will pay more for a great experience. But how do you improve the experience of a customer that is not at all engaged with your brand?
The six superpowers of digital communication
Initiates a conversation
How do you reach customers who are not thinking about your brand? The answer is to use digital communication to plant the seeds that lead to engagement and then to take the disengaged customer on a journey that leads to a fully engaged customer. The quickest way of doing so is to provide relevant and useful information that gets the customer to think about your brand.
Stitches together journeys
Managing customer journeys relies on a combination of channels to move customers from the beginning to the end of the journey. Many of these journeys take the customer from a synchronous engagement (where the customer is actively engaging with a channel in your ecosystem) to the point where they have to break out to another channel (such as filling out a form) or return to the process at another time. Digital communication helps to stitch these journeys together and engage the customer asynchronously (when the customer is not actively engaged within your ecosystem). It also enables you to nudge them back to where they left off and help them re-enter the journey.
Builds relationships
Building relationships goes far beyond offering a great product or service. Organisations need to speak to their customers. It’s not possible to build a relationship in silence. Your customers are constantly being wooed by competitors, so you need to show that you care and, perhaps even more importantly, you need to provide value. Organisations also need to equip customers to make good decisions (beyond products and services).
Drives digital adoption
When someone isn’t using a channel, for example, it’s important to find a logical entry point (possibly through their statements or invoices) into the portal so that they see the benefits of that channel. Just because you built it, does not mean customers will use it. You have to actively drive the adoption of digital channels, and digital communication puts these capabilities in front of the customer.
Nudges behaviour
Digital communication can provide the information and tools that drive customer behaviour in the right direction. Remember, the goal is to create an engaged, and profitable, customer. Things like reminders, notifications and relevant information each help to create an engaged customer. You cannot change the behaviour of a disengaged customer.
Creates convenience
In a world where customers can access virtually anything they want at their fingertips, the last thing they want is to jump through hurdles. It’s imperative, therefore, that you don’t make them work to use your services. Using digital communication, your organisation can create a layer of convenience for your customer. Pushing the right communication (secure, personalised, interactive experiences) to your customer eliminates the need for them to break out of their day, resulting in increased engagement. These experiences can be used to prompt the consumer to take the next step and direct them to the most relevant channel.
Engaging your digital superpowers
When it comes to activating the superpowers of digital communication, it is pivotal that anything your organisation sends out resonates as deeply as possible with your customers. If the communication you send a customer is not engaging at its core, it will not drive engagement. Content must be relevant, presentation thereof must be engaging, and ultimately, the communication must motivate the response you want from the customer.
STRIATA
www.striata.com
